What Doesn't Kill You
by Prosper-the-XVIII
Summary: What doesn't kill you just hurts like hell and really doesn't make you stronger in an way. Whatever life throws at you (or in this case whatever Bill Weasley HITS at you), if your name is Nymphadora Tonks, then it is almost guaranteed to be bad. Fourteen-year-old Tonks learns this the hard way...
1. Prologue

They had always told her that what doesn't kill you makes you stronger. But it turns out that that's not the case. One Quiddich match gone wrong was all it took for Tonks to find out the hard way that what doesn't kill you just hurts like hell and doesn't exactly do anything good for you in the slightest. Oh, and it makes you hate the person who did it to you's guts. In this case that person happened to be Bill Weasley. Tonks, when she was fourteen, found herself with quite a lot of time to think about this.  
Or does it? Well, her name was now on that year's Quiddich Cup, she had earned 5,000 points for her house, Hufflepuff, in the process of _winning _the cup and thus managed to win the House Cup as well. But all the glory for that just reflected off of her and shone on her Quiddich team captain, Jodie Dunne, and senior prefects, Mallory Anderson and Adam Bisset. So really didn't affect her personally well in any way. Well, all that Tonks had learned from that was:  
a) Being in both third year and the most overlooked house in Hogwarts at the same time totally sucked.  
b) She Hated Charlie Weasley with a capital 'H'. And..  
c) Being simultaneously knocked off your broom by a bludger and falling through a goal hoop is not an awful lot of fun.

Whatever life throws at you (or in this case whatever Bill Weasley HITS at you), if your name is Nymphadora Tonks, then it is almost certain to be bad. This is the story of when Tonks learned that.

Oh, and did I mention, at this point she both developed and expressed very different feelings indeed for Bill's younger brother, Charlie...


	2. Chapter 1

**The first bit was just what I wanted to say in the summary but didn't have room for. This is the real deal!**

* * *

Tonks adored the feeling of the wind blowing through her hair and making her Quiddich robes billow out behind her in a flurry of gold and black. And she had never loved it more than at that moment. Last Quiddich match of the season. Her team winning against Gryffindor 190-70. And the tiny gold blur less than two feet away from her nose reminded her that all was still to play for, but victory was within her touching distance...

Tonks turned around to face her team captain and beater, Jodie Dunne, flashed her a smile and quickly turned the ends of her hair, which was shoulder-length and black for the occasion, gold, indicating that she had seen the Snitch. Jodie nodded, but mistimed a hit at a bludger at the same time, the ball hitting her full in the face. Blood from her broken nose sprayed everywhere, but Jodie carelessly wiped it off with the back of her hand and pelted the bludger towards Gryffindor's keeper, Michael Harpe.

Tonks kept one eye firmly on the tiny golden ball flitting in front of her face, the other on Bill Weasley, the other team's Seeker and captain. He was right at the other end of the pitch, so Tonks gritted her teeth, and haphazardly stood up on her broom. She reached out for the snitch, and swiftly grabbed it.

Seraphina, a ditsy Welsh Slytherin who had been assigned to commentating, called out; "AND NYMPHADORA TONKS HAS THE SNITCH! HUFFLEPUFF HAVE WON THIS YEAR'S QUIDDICH CUP!" Madam Hooch shouted at the same time; "Hufflepuff win!"

* * *

Bill was furious. How could this kid, who was three years younger than him, barely came up to his chest height-wise and was probably only half his weight have beaten his team and their careful hours of precision training? He was fuming; metaphorically, but if he was literally then he quite frankly wasn't surprised. Then the bludger speeding towards his face gave him an idea.

He pulled his wand out of his pocket, and whispered almost silently a curse that trained the bludger on Tonks. The third year screamed as she dodged it, the snitch still in her hand. The second time that it flew at her, she wasn't quite so lucky...

* * *

Tonks heard something snap as the bludger slammed into her shin, then knocked her through the goal hoop and broke her FlameTail 250 broom clean in half. Pain exploded in the leg the bludger had hit, and she was free-falling towards the ground at an impossible speed. She knew that impact was going to hurt far more, so shut her eyes tight, waited for landing and prayed that the next thing to happen wouldn't be her head smashing open off of the hard ground...

* * *

There was no feeling in any part of Tonks's body. Just pain. Everywhere. She couldn't breathe, her limbs were sore and dead. She felt someone shaking her by the shoulders and recognized Jodie's voice. "Nymphadora? Nymphadora?"  
"Don't...call me...Nymphadora..." Tonks groaned before she passed out...


	3. Chapter 2

"Okay, what happened, where am I and why can't I move my legs?" Tonks tried to sit up, but felt Madam Pomfrey force her back down by her shoulders. Bloody Quiddich, Tonks thought. Fun at the best of times, but when it went wrong...oh, Jesus. Saying it hurts was a complete understatement.  
"God, Dunne, for the last time, you can go!" Madam Pomfrey barked at Jodie, who Tonks noticed was sat beside her.  
"Yeah, but-"  
"No buts. It's a broken nose; being a beater, I'm sure it's something you're no stranger to."  
"Just let me stay here until it's stopped bleeding!" Jodie laid a tentative finger to her nose, which was bunged up with a couple of bits of loo roll and now made her more-or-less resemble Professor Snape.  
"Episkey!" Madam Pomfrey pointed her wand at Jodie's face, and in an instant her nose was back to normal. "Now would you kindly remove yourself from my line of vision. As you can see, I'm too busy to have you skulking around."  
And with that, Jodie Apparated out of the Hospital Wing, Madam Pomfrey yelling; "JODIE! DON'T YOU...oh, for god's sake, what's the point? Nymphadora-"  
"Tonks..." she muttered.  
"Okay, Tonks, we have a big problem in the sense of lack of SkeleGrow, and that's bad because the bludger hit you in the leg and broke your tibia in three places. Now, there is an incredibly slim chance that I can fix it by magic, but I think that it's a bit major for Episkey. Could you do me a favor and open up your hand? Couple of broken fingers,and you're still holding the snitch. If I'm going to do anything about it then you're going to have to release your grip."  
"I-I can't. I literally can't."  
Madam Pomfrey got hold of Tonks's fingers and prised them off of the tiny golden ball. Tonks grimaced and let out a low groan as she felt pain sear up her hand and her skin tear off of the areas she had been gripping the snitch with.  
"Episkey!" Madam Pomfrey said again, pointing her wand at Tonks's injured hand. The spell stung a little, but was instant relief.  
"How long am I likely to be here? I have a HUGE Defense Against the Dark Arts test next week and if I miss it-"  
"Well you're going to have to," Madam Pomfrey said abruptly. "There is absolutely no way you can go anywhere on that leg at any point within the next three weeks."  
"Oh dammit!"  
Bill Weasley, Tonks thought, as soon as I can use magic out of school, I will literally kill you and that is a promise not a threat.


	4. Chapter 3

"Bill Weasley, you had better have a good excuse!" Professor McGonagall glared at the red-headed seventh year  
in front of her, still wearing his Quiddich robes. "Well? I must say, you're lucky you're not being expelled!"  
"Well, go ahead, expel me, see if I care! The little bitch got what was coming for her!"  
"Bill!" McGonagall shouted. "Your mother and Andromeda and Ted Tonks, Nymphadora's parents, are both here and I'm not entirely convinced that you would be so quick to say that in front of them, nor am I sure that you understand the severity of this situation. A girl is currently in the hospital wing with a severely fractured leg due to you unnecessarily jinxing a bludger and turning it on her. Now I have dealt with people being deliberately injured in Quiddich by other players and rogue bludgers, but never both at once, and by the Head Boy of all people. Saying that I am disappointed is a complete understatement."  
"Okay, I get it. Wait, Nymphadora Tonks? She's my brother's best mate. I didn't know it was her."  
"Bill, that won't work. You knew full well who it was, there's only one metamorphagus in Hufflepuff, and in the whole school for that matter, and that's Miss watched her change the color of her hair and eyes about seven times during the match and the commentator said her name several times over. You knew full well who you were training the bludger on and can I remind you that I have access to Veritaserum if need be, so if you want that forced down your throat then carry on by all means."

God, Bill thought, you really can't win when magic gets involved.

* * *

Tonks stared at her Patronus, currently in it's animal form - a peacock - strutting across her legs and flicked an annoying lock of hair out of her face.  
"If you're here," Belle, a first year Ravenclaw who was currently in the bed next to Tonks on account of breaking her wrist falling off her broom, said. "Then how come you don't get homework like everyone else?"  
"Well, I don't think any of my teachers see a point in sending it for me; I'm good at doing homework but not as good at returning it in one piece and not covered in mud, owl crap or liquid luck. Hey, you do realize that you're meant to eat Chocolate Frogs, not just let them crawl all over your face? It's unhygienic Bloody hell, where did that come from? I sound like my MUM."  
"I KNOW," Belle said indignantly. "I just missed my mouth. Hey, what are you missing today?"  
"Double Defense Against the Dark Arts, Arithmancy, Astrology, Transfiguration, Charms, double Potions- eurgh - and Muggle Studies. What about you?"  
"Do you by any chance want to be an Auror? I'm meant to have Divination, Potions, Charms, Herbology, Care of Magical Creatures, Charms again, Flying, A History of Magic and then detention with Professor Binns. I don't think that's fair how I got it though, all I did was throw a blackboard eraser through him to see what would happen!"  
"Well, it could be worse, you could have it with Snape. He sent me a note saying he expects me to continue the detentions I'll miss while I'm here," Tonks shrugged and investigated a random bruise on the back of her hand. "Well, I just transfigured it into a button, then I'm going to miss the detentions and tell him that the owl ate it."


End file.
